


The Empty Road

by LaneMartin13



Series: Parkner Week 2019 [7]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Hopeful Ending, I didn't want it to be but it was, M/M, analysis of the prospect of death, contemplative and reflective but is an actual story, mentions of it but nothing graphic, talks a lot about death, unfortunately
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-09
Updated: 2019-08-09
Packaged: 2020-08-13 08:35:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20171320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaneMartin13/pseuds/LaneMartin13
Summary: Parkner Week Day 7: AngstOR: Harley James Keener did not understand death.





	The Empty Road

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you like it!

Harley James Keener didn’t think he understood death at all.

His confusion on the matter began at the ripe age of six when his father left to get scratchers and he never came back. Without a word, without a note, no proper goodbye, he was gone without a trace. Dust collected over the empty space he left behind and a hole formed in their family, growing, festering, collecting the memories that were left behind and attempting to bury them.

This was the first time Harley experienced death, however metaphorical. It was the death of a parental figure and it wrecked him all the same.

It’s 2:27am when Harley mentally buries the image of his father.

He didn’t understand it when his mother was crushed against her steering wheel when her car wrapped around a tree, her body smothered by a fiery blanket that warmed her until it took her life.

He didn’t understand it when he stood at her funeral, unable to see because of the tears stabbing and burning his eyes, unable to breathe because his chest was crushing his lungs, and unable to feel because the woman who raised him was gone and now it was just him and his little sister.

It’s 12:45pm when Harley buries his mother in the ground.

He didn’t understand death when the world only got crueler and his little sister was taken from him too, quicker than a gust of wind breezing through a deserted land that hadn’t seen the rain in decades. Tony had been working to adopt both Keener children after their mother’s death but before Harley could even blink, one name had to be erased from the papers.

It’s 10:15pm when Harley gets the call and it’s 1:10pm when his sister is lowered into the ground beside his mother.

He didn’t think he could ever understand it, he would later come to realize. He didn’t understand it when Peter woke up screaming in the early stages of their relationship, crying and recalling the death of his parents, of Uncle Ben, his fear of losing Aunt May— all the pain, all the death surrounding him, so much death.

It’s 5:13am when Harley realizes that he still doesn’t understand death. It’s 5:14am when he realizes that it never goes away.

It’s years later and he’s standing in the rubble of what his home once was, his suit is damaged, he’s exhausted, and he feels like he just woke up from a five year nap. He’s standing there on the verge of collapse because mere feet in front of him is his father, half his body burned and his breaths slow and stuttering and PENELOPE won’t answer him when he inquires about Tony’s status. He didn’t understand it when he collapsed to his knees in front of the man who raised him, beside the woman who did the same, and in front of his boyfriend who had grown to love Tony as he did. He didn’t understand it when he begged for Tony to _please, please, stay, I can’t lose you too, please dad, _and for the first time in as along as Harley has known him, the man broke a promise.

He didn’t understand it when Tony muttered his last words to his loved ones surrounding him. He didn’t understand it when Tony’s reactor flickered out and he had to watch another father go.

It’s 2:56am when Harley loses his father and it’s 9:30am when he watches the ring of flowers protecting his heart glide through the water of his home.

He didn’t understand death. When the man came, when he left, when he would come again, who he would take with him this time, if he would take them all at once or if he would leave stragglers behind to pick up the pieces and follow down the empty road, searching for something they would never find. He wondered if they had been on this road since the moment their hearts started beating and if death traveled parallel to it, flying in when they passed their invisible mark or whenever he so pleased, sweeping them away and leaving the stragglers behind for later. He wondered if they were meant to walk this road until death came for them too.

It’s 6:24am when Harley realizes that one day, he will cross his invisible mark.

He’s twenty six and staring up at the beautiful sky above him, taking in everything it has to offer without seeing its ends, and maybe, maybe, he understood death.

His senses were heightened but oddly muddled, he could feel the blood blossoming from the deep wound in his abdomen, he could hear the sirens in the distance and the fading sounds of the battle but he couldn’t quite make out the words of the person etching their way into his line of sight and blocking out the beautiful sky. The sky he wanted to see so desperately. The sky he liked to think his mother, his sister, and his father were looking down at him from. But then the person was covering the sky and he was far more beautiful than any star in the galaxy.

Harley wished his mother could have seen this sight instead of the fiery inferno that took her life before she could even register what had happened. He wished his sister could’ve had this view before she was taken too. He was thankful that his father had a sight just as beautiful as this one and he was grateful that he had one too.

He wanted to tell the man above him that he loved him, he wanted to say something to make it better. Something along the lines of _it’s okay, I understand now _or _I love you _but his mouth wouldn’t form the words and he couldn’t read Peter’s lips properly and he think he saw Pepper’s hair in the background and maybe Uncle Steve’s shield but everything was fuzzy and his vision was blackening and he wondered if now was when he would meet the man he had never understood.

He didn’t know what time it is when his eyes fluttered closed and he lost the world and maybe, just maybe, he understood death.

It’s 3:25am when Harley wakes up to an irritating beeping behind him and his husband sobbing beside him with their daughter clinging onto him with a vice like grip. It’s 3:26am when Peter notices he’s awake and Harley has his family suddenly in his arms, clutching onto him. Harley holds onto them both like he hasn’t been touched in decades, and for the first time in a long time, sobs wrack his frame. It’s 3:27am when everyone in the hall hears the commotion and the room gets smaller as the amount of bodies in the space only increase.

It’s 3:40am and Harley did not understand death. Who it took and who it didn’t, who it brushed and who it strangled.

It’s 3:41am and Harley realizes that he doesn’t need to understand it. It’s 3:42am and his daughter is in his arms and he’s in his husband’s arms when he begins to let go of death.

It’s 3:42am when Harley James Keener-Stark moves on and it’s 3:43am when he begins to understand life.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> Kudos and comments are always greatly appreciated :)
> 
> My tumblr is harleykeenerdeservesbetter so feel free to reach out (leave prompts, ask questions, chat, anything)!


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